24 
Taxation on Land. 
This redemption of personalty from its liability shows that 
there has been a radical change in the law which demands 
serious consideration at the present period, especially when it is 
borne in mind that fresh charges have been, time after time, 
heaped upon what was once a poor rate pure and simple, until 
its designation has become a complete misnomer. Perhaps no 
better reasons can be given for introducing this reform, at the 
expense of real property-holders, than those surmised in the 
historical introduction to Castle on Rating, where it is stated 
that “ either from the difficulty of assessing personal property, 
or from the still popular principle of throwing all burdens upon 
land, a custom sprang up in many parishes of not assessing this 
class of property.” These remarks were made in 1886, but 
surely if our resources enable us to raise and collect taxes on 
personal property for imperial purposes, no difficulty need arise 
for the collection of local rates. It is probable that, had it not 
been for the well-known apathy in more prosperous times of the 
agricultural classes in respect of matters which affected their 
interests, this custom would never have existed. I have ob- 
served within the last few years the same want of self-assertion 
on the part of farmers on the Assessment Committees of 
Boards of Guardians (where small towns are incorporated in 
Unions with agricultural parishes), and found that a few 
dominant members, representing the assessment of house- 
property, have persistently refused to bring down the assess- 
ment of farms in the Union to such values as the law directed. 
This was in one instance carried to such an extent as to materi- 
ally interfere with the letting value of property under my 
management, and I was obliged to take action to protect the 
landlord’s interests. 
But supposing, for the sake of argument, that it was 
possible to prove that no injustice or hardship to owners and 
occupiers of real property existed by the exclusion of personal 
property from its share of the burden, there yet remain to 
be considered the rules by which the assessments are made, as 
between the different classes of occupiers. Does the governing 
principle of the law, as it now stands, apportion the burden 
fairly between occupiers who live upon their means or earn in- 
comes from trade and occupy houses, and the other class of 
occupiers who earn their living from the land ? If a fair appor- 
tionment of the burden is understood to mean that each person 
should pay according to his means, the present system is radically 
wrong, and very unjust. The income of a farmer is approximately 
estimated, for income tax purposes, at half the rent of the land 
he occupies. This is not very wide of the mark for an average 
